


If You Can Imagine That They're Alive, You Can Imagine That They're Dead

by orphan_account



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Gen, Hallucinations, Spiders
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-19
Updated: 2015-08-19
Packaged: 2018-04-15 15:13:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4611465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>they're n o t real</p>
            </blockquote>





	If You Can Imagine That They're Alive, You Can Imagine That They're Dead

**Author's Note:**

  * For [how_its_going_to_be](https://archiveofourown.org/users/how_its_going_to_be/gifts).



Parker was on his kitchen counter top again. 

There were more spiders. 

Or were there? Was he just hallucinating them all? 

There were dozens of them, and whether they were real or not, Parker didn't like them. He didn't know what to do. It had been ages since Nico had come that one night, and Parker had decided that he probably wasn't going to come back. 

Nico might have killed the real spiders, but who was going to kill the ones in Parker's imagination?

He began breathing faster, clawing at his face. He knew he shouldn't, but he couldn't get rid of the feeling that something was crawling all over his skin. 

He didn't like it.

Soon, the prickly sensation was replaced by a shock of pain as blood began running down Parker's face. He froze. He hadn't meant to make himself bleed.

His parents would yell at him. They'd yell and yell. They just wanted him to be normal... but he wasn't normal, was he?

Parker tucked his face in between his knees. He tried ignoring the spiders, but- but what if they were on his legs, or his arms, or something? 

"Help," Parker whispered.

Suddenly, someone's hand was on Parker's shoulder. He looked up and was met by a pair of brown eyes. "Nico?"

Nico cupped the part of Parker's face that wasn't bleeding with his hand. "What's up?"

"They're still here... they're always there..."

Nico looked behind him. He turned back to Parker, confused. "What do you mean? They're all gone. Either gone or dead, dude. It's okay."

Parker shook his head. "I... I'm sorry, I just... they're not gone, look at them all..."

Nico turned around again. He blinked. "Oh," he said. He looked back at Parker.

"They're not real, okay?"

"But... but they seem real, and... no, it's- I'm sorry, I'm stupid, I-"

"No, it's not stupid. Don't ever say that, Parker. You're not stupid. You've just got a mind more creative than most. See the spiders? Look at them. What do they look like, Parker?"

Parker peered over Nico's head at the spiders all across the ground. "Brown," he whispered, "and... really big..."

"Well," Nico said, "if you can imagine that they're alive, you can imagine that they're dead."

"Huh?"

"Look, okay? Close your eyes."

Parker did as he was told.

"Okay, like, picture a weapon. Like, the biggest *potato* weapon in the world. And now, there's me! I've got the weapon. I'm good at holding it, right? Yeah, I'm good at everything. So, yeah, I can take the weapon, and I can use it to do what?"

"To kill all the spiders?"

"Yeah. All of 'em. Open your eyes, look."

Parker opened his eyes. The spiders were still there. Nico was standing in the middle of them. "Look," Nico said, "you see one? Where is it?'

Parker pointed at one of them. 

"Yeah? There's one right there? Here, look- oh, I've smashed it, I've shot it, I've impaled it- whatever, it's dead. See?"

The spider vanished. Parker looked at all the others, but suddenly, they had vanished, too.

"Oh," he said.

"Yeah," Nico said. "Now, what are you gonna do next time?"

"Uh..."

"Real Nico kills all the real spiders, okay? So, then, fake Nico can kill all the fake spiders. And if the fake ones turn out to be real, real Nico will kill them. And if real spiders kill Parker, real Nico will be there in the afterlife, waiting for him. Okay?"

"Okay," Parker said.


End file.
